


the beauty that still remains

by closedcaptioning



Category: Code Geass, Death Note (Anime & Manga), Durarara!!, Hunter X Hunter, Naruto, Ouran High School Host Club - All Media Types, ワンパンマン | One-Punch Man, 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Character Study, Counted Word Fic, Crushes, Drabble Collection, F/F, Ficlet Collection, Fluff, Kissing, M/M, Pining, Rare Pairings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-20
Updated: 2020-02-29
Packaged: 2020-10-24 23:10:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 3,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20714093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/closedcaptioning/pseuds/closedcaptioning
Summary: A collection of drabbles/ficlets, 100-500 words. Prompts welcome!





	1. Secret (L/Light)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 100

Sometimes, Light will have flashes of the past- he’ll see L nibbling on chocolate, dark powder dotting his chin. He’ll hear a clack and look over, a “Ryuzaki-” at the tip of his tongue-

Sometimes he feels like he’s in a burlap sack, and he can’t get out because the sides are slippery like cellophane and he’s confused and something _ cracks _-

(he’ll remember touching L’s porcelain skin, tinted with a slight blush -remember feeling the shell of L’s ear underneath his fingers as he leaned in to whisper his biggest secret-

-not that he was Kira, but that-

_ I love- _


	2. Durian (Gaara/Uchiha Sasuke)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 200

It happened slowly, like this: the copper tang of blood in Sasuke’s throat. Gaara’s sandpaper voice. Dreams of the color red. Fingers in his hair.

Sasuke would look back, knowing it had been some sort of accident. Watching his own heart monitor spike from his hospital bed, fingers twisting into the sheets. But which was the accident, he would never be able to answer. The way the fight ended -- or that it had even started in the first place?

It had been about nothing. About the same thing anything was ever about for him. Itachi’s eyes, swirling red. Naruto’s too-white pearly smile. The shadows that still crept under his bed, because he had never had a father to scare them away.

This was the silence after his breath. This was the slow, meticulous way he shredded the letter of apology he received from Suna in the mail four days after the fight. This was the sixteen sheets of paper he scraped holes in with his eraser before he finally found the right words:

_ You tasted like raspberries. Have you ever had a durian? It tastes like garlic and caramel. Opposites that complement each other. I think you would like it.  _


	3. Rise (Neji/Lee)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 200

Lee has chalk on his hands and dust in his throat, screams and fights even when he’s on the verge of collapse. Lee’s like a balloon, filled with helium and rising and glorious but Neji wonders when he’s going to  _ pop _ -

“Neji, let’s spar!” Lee says. Neji has to wrench Lee’s arm behind his back before he finally concedes. They’re both panting. “I’ll beat you next time, Neji,” Lee declares. The wind billows through his hair, and a bit of red trails out of his mouth.

He’s beautiful.

Lee’s rough where Neji is polished, passionate where Neji is listless. Lee is still rising, high into the stratosphere, and Neji can’t do anything but watch. Neji’s life was full of  _ branch house _ and  _ know your place _ and  _ Hinata  _ and he wonders where Lee got the audacity- the blinding intensity- that allows him to declare so firmly,  _ You’re my rival. _ Lee makes Neji unsure of his footing, and Neji can’t help but envy Lee’s unblemished  _ belief _ , and he wonders if he’ll ever live to see Lee  _ pop- _

Lee says his customary  _ I’ll beat you next time, _ and Neji responds with an  _ I’m counting on it,  _ even though he means,  _ You already have. _


	4. Snow (Sakura/Ino)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 200

The first punch Sakura blocked.

The second she caught, gracefully, halfway to her jaw, and Ino hated her for how beautiful she looked, hated her for how easily she ducked Ino’s wheeling kick, how her strawberry-pink hair caught the snowflakes as she did and made her look like some sort of wintry goddess, ruler of a kingdom of snow, reflecting light in a thousand prisms of silvery ice and the delicate balance between the sky and the snow-laden trees, between the two of them, training all alone in the woods because even though Ino had wanted to say “no” there was that smile again, that green-eyed mischievous tag-you’re-it smile. 

Ino hated that smile. She hated the thought that the first person to kiss Sakura would probably be Sasuke. She hated Sasuke then, too, hated the permanent lines his frown etched into his forehead, hated the way Sakura fell apart for him, hated the way she would smile at Ino like the world was hers and then turn around and offer the same smile to  _ him _ like it meant nothing.

When Sakura’s blow landed, it was a relief, in a way. Ino didn’t want to see the triumph in her eyes.


	5. Loaded Gun (Kida/Mikado)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 200
> 
> Prompt: Start or end with the sentence "what would it feel like to go under for the last time?"

Why was it so hard to say?

Kida knew Mikado. He knew the gentle boy from his childhood, who wanted the kind of adventure you found in storybooks. He knew the Mikado who would smile and play, whose mouth was full of  _ Masaomi _ \--  _ Masaomi, look at this,  _ and _ Masaomi, where were you?,  _ and  _ Masaomi, not again,  _ hopeful and endeared and frustrated. 

Who was the person who stood before him now?

Mikado’s hands shake where he holds the gun.

_ Stop, you don’t have to do this,  _ Kida says _ . _

_ You don’t get it.  _ Mikado laughs bitterly. 

_ Please-  _ Kida tries.

_ I’ve never fired a gun before, _ Mikado warns hysterically.  _ I don’t know where I’ll shoot _ .

_ No, Mikado, I’m sorry.  _ And as he says it, he realizes why he’s apologizing-  _ I dragged you into this whole mess.  _

_ Just- stop. This is… something I have to do. _ Mikado’s eyes are wild. He brings the gun towards his head, and Kida  _ lunges- _

There’s a  _ bang _ , jarring in the eerily still night.

_ Mi- ka- do… I _ … his mouth shapes the words, but he can’t  _ say _ them- 

And in that last moment, Kida found himself wondering: 

what would it feel like to go under for the last time?

  
  
  



	6. Crush (Todoroki/Bakugou)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 200
> 
> Prompt: As your first or last line, write "He didn’t know when it had started, but he knew he wanted it to last."

He didn’t know when it had started, but he knew he wanted it to last. 

Bakugou would never admit it, but he enjoyed how easily flustered Todoroki seemed to get around him. Just asking him for an eraser in his typical hurry-up-or-you-die monotone made Todoroki flush as pink as Ashido. Brushing shoulders with him in the hallway made him redder than his hair. When changing for gym, Bakugou had accidentally-on-purpose made eye contact with Todoroki as he slid his shirt off over his head and they’d all had to evacuate, because that idiot had _ set his own gym uniform on fire. _

Crushes were for middle school. This was _ high school _. Going easy on Todoroki would mean Bakugou would have to tolerate his weakness, and that was one thing he never did. 

So it was a game to Bakugou. Why would it be anything else? 

Hagakure knew all the gossip. There was a smile in her voice when she told Bakugou about the words Todoroki had scribbled in the margins of his notes. Bakugou didn’t care. Why should he? Why should he lie awake thinking about how he was the best and worst thing that had ever happened to Todoroki Shouto?


	7. Ugly Sweater (Kurapika/Chrollo Lucifer)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 300

Kurapika’s heart has been shattered. Stomped on. Torn apart.

“There’s no need to be so dramatic.” Chrollo prods him in the arm. “Did you really think I would wear that?”

Kurapika’s response is muffled. Chrollo grins and flops down next to him. “I can’t understand you when you sulk.”

“I  _ said _ \--” Kurapika raises his head, and feels an irrational surge of rage at the way Chrollo’s bangs curl adorably over his forehead, the way his small smile sparkles in his eyes and plays over his lips and --  _ dang  _ it, why does he have to be so  _ cute _ ? “-- if you weren’t so selfish --”

“Selfish!” Chrollo bites his lower lip, either hurt or trying not to laugh, Kurapika can’t tell; it might be both. It’s hard to focus, because Chrollo has scooted forward so their shoulders are brushing and their thighs are pressed together and all Kurapika can think about right now is how  _ good _ Chrollo smells, like ink and salt water and the ocean. “Selfish. Really. Because I won’t wear a sweater the color of a  _ cesspool _ \--”

“Gon’s my  _ friend _ , and he was kind enough to take the time to knit you --”

“He’s already coming over for dinner, what more do you --”

“If you want to get on his  _ good _ side, you know, you’re already on thin ice after that whole incident with Hisoka --” Kurapika cuts himself off with a breathy gasp, because Chrollo is kissing that tender spot right behind his jawline, and now it’s really impossible to think.

“What do you think that boy would say,” Chrollo murmurs in a low voice that sends shivers up Kurapika’s spine, “if he walked in and I was wearing  _ only _ his sweater?”

Kurapika’s laugh twists into a moan as Chrollo’s mouth moves down his neck. “I think he’d be scarred for life.” 


	8. Comfortable (Tamaki/Kyoya)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 150
> 
> Prompt: A story told only through dialogue.

“Kyoyaaa, I’m bored.”

“Well, maybe if you took your head off my lap, you could go bother Haruhi. Or the twins. Or  _ literally _ anyone else.”

“But your lap is so  _ comfortable _ . You can’t blame me for wanting to stay here.”

“I bet Haruhi’s lap is comfortable, too.”

“But she’s not  _ you. _ ”

“What’s so good about  _ me _ ? I thought you liked Haruhi.”

“Awwww, are you jealous~?”

“...What? Of course not.”

“Wait,  _ really _ ? You’re  _ jealous!” _

“No, I’m not _ . _ ”

“Come on, Kyoya, I thought you knew that you’re my favorite. How could you doubt our relationship when we’ve been through  _ so much  _ together?!”

“Okay, okay, I get it! Just be quiet already, people are looking over here-”

“Oh, are they? Should we give them something else to look at, then?”

“No we  _ shouldn’t _ \-- wait, what are you-  _ mmph- _ ”

“There.”

“What was that  _ for _ \-- Tamaki!”

  
“This way, everyone will know that I prefer  _ you _ .”


	9. X-Ray (Genos/Sonic)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 219
> 
> Prompt: Alphabet fic (each sentence starts with a different letter of the alphabet).

“X-ray vision?” Sonic stares, disbelieving, at the cyborg. “Really?”

“I must improve if I ever hope to match my master,” Genos answers, stony-faced. “Upgrades allow me to work towards the level of strength I aspire to.”

“ Mmm-hmm -- I have a question for you then, Genos.” The ninja drops into a crouch, feeling the delicious tingle of adrenaline rush through him. 

“Question? Are you trying to take me by surprise?”

“Not at all.” Before Genos can blink, Sonic’s fist is halfway to his face. He blocks the blow, but Sonic is behind him half an instant later. _ Zigzag. Dodge the blast. Catch yourself, and land on the balls of your feet. Victory is so close. _“Let me see proof.”

“... Proof I have x-ray vision?”

“Exactly.” _ Kiss that pretty face of yours goodbye, _Sonic silently whispers to himself, blade humming in his hands. Just one more moment, and Genos will finally --

For a man weighed down by a huge hunk of metal, Genos moves impossibly fast -- his blast has shatters Sonic’s sword to dust before even Sonic realizes what’s happening, and the ninja finds himself pinned to the ground under the full weight of Genos’s body before he can say _ slowpoke _.

Genos’ face is inches from his, completely emotionless. “Orange.”

“W-What?”

“Your underwear is orange.”


	10. Strings (Izaya/Shizuo)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 497
> 
> Prompt: Alphabet fic (each sentence starts with a different letter, and you have to use all of them. No repeats).

Izaya had seen the strings for as long as he could remember.

They stretched across the city in a blood-red web, entangling people’s lives and ruining them, and always, always present — the red string that was conspicuously absent on his parents’ fingers, the one connecting his twin sisters since they were born. And his own, always leading off somewhere into the distance. Some days, he wanted to follow it, to see who the person on the other end of the string was. Most of the time, though, he found himself surrounded by so much red that he would lose track of where his own fate was, twirled around his finger.

People would marvel at the way Izaya always seemed to know everything, manipulate everything behind the scenes, play people like a master puppeteer. Once, when Namie asked him how he knew the things he did, Izaya leaned back in his chair and tried to explain. “You know the periodic table?” he drawled. “Elements like sodium. Fluorine. Reactive elements that form compounds with others. Under all the bluster and confusion, deep down, everyone has a partner-- take the two mini gang leaders or the headless rider and the doctor.”

He stopped and took a breath, twirling his pen languidly around his fingers. “What element do I play? Xenon is a noble gas, so it doesn’t have a partner, but stands alone, unreactive yet still looming large over the other elements, casting its shadow over everything they do. Know what I mean?” Namie didn’t, but then again, Izaya hadn’t really expected her to.

Gods had different definitions to different people, and Izaya was unquestionably the underground deity of Ikebukuro. Choreographing the dance of the residents of Ikebukuro was easy enough. But for all of Izaya’s power and pulling of strings, he had still been unprepared when he had met the angry man on the other end of his own string— more times than he could count, Izaya ended up attempting to use his knife on what he saw as a deceitful chain of red but what others saw as just empty air. 

“Die, you damn flea-” Vicious words that traveled along the length of the taut red string that connected Shizuo to Izaya, part of the intricate sticky spider-web that criss-crossed across the city, trapping everyone in its cocoon. 

“Zoos are less rowdy than you are, Shizu-chan~” Joking words to mask the way Izaya was pointedly not looking at Shizuo’s hands, where he knew an invisible string led back to him.

Lies were Izaya’s own cocoon of string, and if he had to look in the mirror every day and pretend nothing tied him down, if he blamed the electric feeling he got on the adrenaline of the moment, if he had to taunt and insult and fight Shizuo because he was afraid if he opened his mouth something entirely different would come out— then so be it, because it didn’t mean anything. 

Question was, did anything, really?


	11. Go Along (Lelouch/Suzaku)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 200
> 
> Prompt: Person A sees their ex at a bar/party -- could Person B pretend to be their date, just for a little while?

  
  


Lelouch feels rather than sees Shirley enter the room --  _ of course,  _ Milly invited her. Shirley’s presence has always been bright, sweet like the taste of ice-cold water on a hot day. It’s precisely because of this that Lelouch turns away. His eyes seize upon Suzaku, standing at the side of the room. 

Suzaku raises his glass in greeting. Lelouch smiles at Suzaku, slinging an arm around him and pulling him in, using the sudden proximity to bring his lips to Suzaku’s ear. “Just go along with this,” he murmurs. 

Suzaku gives him a questioning gaze. This close, Lelouch can see a glint of crimson in Suzaku’s eyes. “Just go along with it,” Lelouch repeats, fisting his hands in Suzaku’s hair.

Lelouch doesn’t know what compels him to do it -- maybe it’s Shirley’s voice over the crowd, maybe it’s the wine from earlier, maybe it’s the way Suzaku’s tongue darts out to wet his lips as he opens his mouth to talk. If nothing else, it’s the fact that life is an all-or-nothing game of risk. Lelouch leans down -- the kiss is gentle, chaste, far more soft than either of them have the right to be, but Lelouch knows it’s enough.


	12. Glass (Temari/Tenten)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from CeruleanShockwave!
> 
> Word count: 300

Tenten doesn’t like mirrors. Vanity has never been her thing -- she would sweat off any makeup after a day’s session with Gai, and besides, she has neither the time nor talent for meticulous arts like those of beauty. There’s also the time she was thrown into a mirror prison jutsu -- that one hurt. It took her a long time to pick all the shards out of her skin.

She hates fragility. As a weapons master, Tenten has learned that durability means reliability, and her oldest kunais are usually the ones she reaches for first in battle. She has seen the way the other girls in the village crumble at the slightest touch, at a glance, and she thinks,  _ I will never be like them if I can help it _ . 

Then, the Chunin Exams. Tenten is proud to make it so far, proud to step out into the arena and face the girl from Sand. And then --

Pain. Incredible pain. She wakes up in the hospital with broken ribs and a concussion. “Temari,” Gai tells her, almost reluctantly, “was defeated by Shikamaru,” and though she has no right, Tenten feels she’s been robbed of something.  _ Temari _ , she thinks, and she says nothing. But the day she is released from the hospital, she begins to train harder than she’s ever trained before. Not just with her hands -- Tenten spends hours poring over old scrolls, learning as much as she can about Suna. Sand, she discovers, becomes molten at incredibly high temperatures, and then cools to glass.  _ Temari _ . Tenten trains every day until she’s dead on her feet, and then tumbles headfirst into her dreams, dreams of paper fans and butter knives, of endless dunes and seas of weapons, of the gritty taste of sand turning to shards of glass on her tongue.


	13. Serenity (Todoroki/Iida)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 250
> 
> Another prompt from CeruleanShockwave!

“Guided meditation,” Aizawa called it. “To help you destress after exams.” 

“You could just give us a free period,” Bakugou mumbled. Aizawa didn't glance in his direction, but he did add that attendance was mandatory.

So Todoroki is now lying on his back on the floor of the darkened gym, listening to a hundred kids breathe around him as a recording drones on about “the serenity behind their eyes.” If there was ever any serenity to be found in his own head, Todoroki thinks he’s probably lost it somewhere during the string of tragic events that make up his life. But it is inexplicably calming, just sitting here in the dark and breathing in unison with everyone else. Todoroki thinks about how, somewhere in this space, Midoriya is a tiny island in this chorus of breaths. Bakugou too. And even Iida, who never seems to take the time to breathe, to sit and be silent, to absorb others’ silences. Todoroki lets his mind linger on that thought. Iida, sleeping. Todoroki pictures him in his mind -- all sharp jawline and righteous determination -- and then imagines smoothing out that ever-present crease between his eyebrows, imagines Iida without his stiffness, his tenseness, without a frown or a grimace. Iida with his eyes shut, his breath mingling in the still air of the gym with Todoroki’s. Todoroki wonders what it would be like to lie next to him, feel the warmth radiating off his body, maybe match their breathing -- inhale and exhale, in tandem. 


	14. Shadows (Sakura/Karin)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Word count: 250
> 
> Prompt by CeruleanShockwave!

Sunset is Karin’s favorite time of the day. Sappy, she knows, but there is something exquisite about the way the sky flushes with the dying sun. Like clockwork, every day a new swirling mural of pinks, golds and reds, so vivid she finds herself blinking for hours afterwards, the blazing imprint of the sun scorched into the darkness of her eyelids.

Sunset is when shadows are longest. Sunset is the before-darkness. Sunset is the time for the tragic, the idyllic, the poets, the lovers, the in-between, the beginnings and the endings. It’s also the time when Sakura trains on the north grounds, right outside Karin’s window. (Karin has a sundown curfew - something about being a former rogue ninja doesn’t exactly inspire trust in the Konoha bigwigs.) And honestly, the sunsets in the Leaf Village are so beautiful that no one, not even the ANBU they have monitoring her, can blame Karin for lingering on the roof to watch the sun go down. And if it happens to illuminate a certain pink-haired kunoichi, lighting up her features like her face is the sun, tracing golden lines over her fine chin and her pink lips pressed thin in concentration, lingering over the fine tone of muscle in her arms, dancing across her skin, calling out the minute gold specks in her eyes that you might be able to see if you are watching very carefully, and she turns at just the right moment - well, so what? That isn’t anybody’s business but Karin’s. 


End file.
